Archive of Our Own

Shane dries his hair with one hand as he quickly unlocks his phone with the other, mouth twitching in a suppressed smile as he listens to the team holler light-hearted chirps at each other. He quirks an eyebrow at the notifications from Instagram, smile breaking through as he sees they are from Ilya.

Their fight still weighed heavily on him. He could not wait to see him again, to apologise and to… well.

He clicks on the messages.

Shane.

You are the best thing in my life.

I love you. Always. Maybe from the first time I saw you.

I am thinking only about you right now. A million memories. Thank you for those.

Whatever happens, I am with you. Safe in your heart. I believe it.

Shane blinks at those words – beautiful, heartbreaking words – as he reads them again and again. He mouths them to himself, hearing them clearly in Ilya’s voice. A voice that even in his mind trembles, and Shane’s heart takes on a strange weight, feeling tight in his chest.

Whatever happens? What did Ilya mean by that?

He is still trying to formulate a response when JJ’s voice rings out in the locker room.

"The Centaurs’ plane disappeared.”

A hush falls over the room - almost like all the air had been stolen from it.

Ah, no, it was just all of the air from Shane’s lungs.

Dimly, in the encroaching darkness of his peripheral vision, he registers Hayden glancing at him. His friend blinks hard, before turning back to JJ, asking him, “What do you mean disappeared?”

“They’re saying it… it just vanished.” JJ answers, and his voice is trembling as he scrolls furiously on his phone, “Caliss! Is this a fucking hoax?”

Shane sees as everyone starts to either pile around JJ or whip out their phones to look at the news themselves. He is frozen, watching them all as though through a bubble. Everyone is moving either too fast or too slow. Everyone has the same shocked look on their faces.

It is Hayden that breaks the tense silence, telling them all softly, “ESPN just posted it, too. That air traffic control lost contact with the Centaurs’ plane fifteen minutes ago…”

No.

Shane does not see as everyone’s heads whip around to face him, does not realise the denial had escaped him in a hoarse, desperate voice.

He only grips his phone tighter, hands shaking as he scrolls to Ilya’s contact. The name Lily and the blank profile picture seem to mock him. Shane does not even realise when Hayden has stepped up behind him, a stabilising touch on his shoulder. He shrugs him off, the touch, soft as it was, feeling sharper than knives to him at this moment.

Shane clicks the green call button…

and the call does not go through.

It beeps immediately, and then -

“Hello, this is Ilya. I will never listen to your voicemail.”

When he collapses on his knees, numb and rendered speechless, Hayden and JJ on their knees to by his side, his entire locker room looks away.

--------------------------------------------

The league suspends all games for the time being, everyone waiting for news. Any news.

Time passes.

It passes differently for Shane…

The day after the plane’s disappearance…

Shane does not sleep.

He thinks Hayden drives him back to his parents’ cottage. He thinks he remembers his mother and father hugging him, crying. He thinks he pats them on the back, before he retreats to his room, booting up every electronic device he owns.

Shane thinks he did all that - he cannot really remember anything.

His eyes remain dry and clear as he scrolls through page after page of flight updates and possible theories of what occurred. It consumes him, and the food his mother places in front of him goes uneaten.

The third day after the plane’s disappearance;

“Shane, sweetie. You need to rest. Please, this is not healthy.”

His mom’s voice grates on his frayed nerves. Shane is exhausted - there had been so many moments over the past few days where all he had wanted to do was rest. How did she not understand? He wanted to rest; he can feel his body begging him to.

But any moment he tries to do so, all he can see is Ilya - hurt and exhausted and needing him. Shane is not an idiot - he knows how much time has passed, and knows what the human body can take. Which means they need to find Ilya now.

So Shane does not rest, because he does not want to see what else his mind can conjure.

He cannot rest, because he needs to find Ilya.

“My darling,” and his mom’s voice rings out again, joining the incessant ringing in his ears, “you can’t keep doing this to yourself. Ilya…” and her voice breaks again, and Shane closes his eyes and tries to breathe through her pain which is so palpable it has blanketed him, “Ilya wouldn’t want that.”

Shane steadily ignores her, looking at the screen, scrolling into the most recent thread of the plane’s disappearance.

“Shane.” Her voice takes on an edge now, even as it trembles, “Shane, you have to… Ilya would not want this for you.”

That breaks him.

He does not know what he screams at her. Among them he thinks he says things like “Ilya wants us to find him! He needs us!” and “How can you give up on him?” But he does know how he feels his heart - one that he thought was already in shattered, unfixable pieces - break as he sees his mom clap her hand over her mouth, eyes squeezed shut, and turn away from him.

His dad stops him when he takes a step towards her, urging him, “Go rest, Shane. Rest. Please.Rest.”

So he goes, though he is terrified of seeing Ilya in his sleep, terrified of what he might say in his dreams, terrified that this is the one way that Ilya can use to say goodbye.

He goes, because seeing his mother cry because of him lifted his haze of numbness for a moment, and he finally sees that Ilya’s disappearance is not just his to bear alone.

The moment his head hits the pillow, Shane falls into a dreamless sleep; a dark abyss that shields him from his heartbreak.

He sleeps for twenty hours.

He wakes dry-eyed and rested, and hating himself for it.

He walks down the stairs and sees his mother talking quietly into her phone. Quietly, he walks over to her. She sees him, because she always does, and ends the call. Before she can ask him what is wrong, he throws his arms around her. He squeezes her, desperately hoping she understands his silent I’m sorry. Forgive me. He feels her fingers running through his hair, understands them to mean Of course I forgive you.

When he starts to move away, she holds him tight by the arms. She looks at him, and her voice trembles when she tells him, “He is my son, too.”

Shane did not know this much pain was possible to bear. He whispers, “I know.”

When they share small smiles that they have to dredge up from the deepest parts of their souls, Shane looks into her watery eyes. In them, Shane sees the first glimpse of the truth he has been running from.

He feels the first of his hope – or maybe his delusion – start to slip away.

One week after;

They announce the end of the search in an official press conference. The Commissioner is there, solemnly shaking the hand of the President of the airline. Both men look suitably upset yet still well-rested, respectful solemnity in their faces.

Shane shakes his head mutely.

He stays silent even as his mother and father start crying as they show each of the members of the Centaurs’ team on the screen, one after the other. There is a melancholic orchestra playing in the background, and their photos have been filtered to black-and-white. Shane feels queasy at the theatrics of it.

As Captain, Ilya is last.

The moment his face appears on screen - his face that Shane sees every time he closes his eyes, his face that he has mapped every inch with his loving touch, his face that he has, would, and will recognise in any lifetime - Shane stands up and walks away.

He continues to keep up with threads online, scrolling until his eyes burn. One of them has a link to Ilya’s instagram. Shane clicks on it, remembering their fight and remembering looking through Ilya’s posts for the first time. It feels like a lifetime ago.

No.

It feels like several lifetimes ago, because Shane has died over and over again since then.

He scrolls through Ilya’s posts again, and tears tiny little cuts into his own heart as he remembers each moment that Ilya had loved and kept safe.

Two weeks later;

The first of the funerals begin for the Centaurs. Zane Boodram’s is first. All of the NHL captains attend. Shane stands amongst them, Hayden next to him.

He is the only captain to attend all of the remaining funerals. He stands ramrod straight at the back of the churches, synagogues, mosques, and cemeteries.

Zane Boodram. Troy Barrett. Harris Drover. Luca Haas. Wyatt Hayes. Evan Dykstra. Nick Chounaird. Brandon Wiebe.

And there are more. So many more.

All these men that Ilya loves, who are only names to Shane because he had never managed to get to know them.

He thinks of that night, Ilya’s invitation to a barbecue. He would go to one every night, he would beg to, if it would bring Ilya home.

He watches silently as their families cry and sees how they comfort each other. He sees how the broken pieces of their hearts mix together, colliding and breaking further - but then… but then shaping into a new, beating one, the sharp edges eroded by a companionship forged with their shared tears and memories.

He grips his hand so tightly that tiny blood droplets seep out of crescent marks, trying desperately to resist the urge to join them.

Three weeks;

Rose sends him the link one night, and he can hear the worry in her voice even through mere words on a screen - “I wanted to make sure you saw this before anyone else shows it to you.”

When he clicks on it, he sees himself in a grainy photo at one of the vigils that Ilya’s fans had set up outside of the Centaurs’ home rink in Ottawa. He remembers that night - he had felt Ilya’s absence like a limb then, and felt so alone in that feeling. So he had driven from his parents’ home to the Centaurs’ rink.

It helped, feeling connected to Ilya through this route that he must have taken hundreds of times since moving here. It helped even more when he walked over slowly to the rink, and he saw the dozens of Centaur plushies in 81 jerseys. Ilya grins at him from multiple photo frames scattered around. Even as he stands there, metres away and begging for bravery to go up to it, Shane watches as a trio of girls, tears running down their cheeks, adds a bouquet of flowers to the unending pile.

No, not just flowers.

Lilies.

His heart cracks further.

Shane could not stop himself then, even if he tried. He walks over, falls to one knee in front of the beautiful show of love, and touches the lilies. His fingers tremble as he does so.

He did not know he was being photographed. But Shane thinks that even if he had known, he would not have had the strength to walk away anyway.

The photograph made its rounds.

Distantly, Shane expected his world to blow up. He waits for the familiar feeling of anxiety of being found out, for his heart to race in fear.

People talked, speculation grew, and rumours flew.

But Shane’s world did not blow up.

That makes sense.

There was no world left to do so.

One month;

Ilya is the only Centaur left with no funeral, with no grave, with no commemoration of his life outside of what the public knew him as – Captain Ilya Rozanov; passionate, talented, and an asshole.

His fans still remember him, dedicating hundreds of video edits every day to his life, sharing stories of the times they had run into him and how he was always hopelessly charming, and placing bottles of vodka in the little memorials set up for him, in Ottawa and Boston, and even in Moscow.

The Boston Bears, led by Cliff Marleau, are one of the teams first back on ice. The season has not started again, based on an unanimous decision from all the teams - after all, in the NHL, everyone knew each other - this was, in the end, everyone’s loss.

They lost a plane full of players and team staff that had been their friends.

Instead, there is a match dedicated to Ilya, and Shane watches, unblinking from the crowd, as a few grown men, again led by Cliff Marleau, cry earnest tears and hold on to each other, as they all stare up at Ilya’s black-and-white smirking face on the screens.

He is still loved by many, but they have their own lives to lead, because in the end… Life goes on.

But not for Shane. He feels frozen in time; stuck in a never-ending nightmare.

And he decides it is not fair that Ilya is the only one without a funeral.

He brings it up one day during dinner - which have become quiet affairs, his parents and him staying only on small talk, all of them too afraid to start talking about anything else that could lead to Ilya. He looks at them. He looks at both his parents, who love Ilya just as fiercely and gently as he had always hoped they would.

“The funerals for the Centaurs’ were beautiful.”

There is a stunned silence to his words, both his mother and father seemingly processing them. Then, they nod.

“Yes,” Yuna says, and Shane recognises the caution in her voice, “Luca Haas’ was last week, right? That seems to be everyone.”

And though Shane knows what she is trying to do, he still glares down at his plate of salmon and brown rice as he grits out, “Not everyone.”

When he looks up at her again, there is a small, sad smile on her face, and hope in her eyes, “No. Not everyone.”

Shane pauses, and he is proud of how his voice barely trembles as he asks, “It should be at the cottage, shouldn’t it?”

His mom nods her head shakily, his dad drops his face in his hands and cries, and they get to planning.

--------------------------------------------

Shane spends all his energy on preparing for the funeral. He needs his touch to be in every step - needs Ilya to know that Shane thought it all through; so he cleans the cottage from floor to window, he chooses the date, he caters the dinner, he orders the flowers.

But he shies away from the invites he knows he needs to send out. His finger hovers over Svetlana’s number, and when he dry heaves on the couch, stomach too empty to do anything else, his mom transfers her contact into her own phone. When it comes to Marleau, his heart beats faster and his palms sweat, and Hayden offers to contact the man instead.

He feels sick, and ashamed, and still so terrified.

That he is here, alone now, the only living testament to their love - and he is still too afraid to share it with the ones who mattered to Ilya.

The day of the funeral dawns on him with a light rain, as if the sky itself was mourning too. He hugs Hayden and Jackie as they arrive, and hugs Rose even tighter when she comes in crying herself. She whispers to him, “I wish I gotten a chance to know him better”, and he nods into her shoulder, unable to say anything to those words.

When Marleau arrives, he stands at the entrance for a moment, simply looking at Shane. Shane’s heart beats faster, waiting for some reprimand he is sure is coming. Instead, Marleau holds out a hand to him. When Shane reaches out and clasps it, he lets out a surprised sound when Marleau pulls him in for a hug, instead.

“Thank you for doing this, Hollander.” There is no judgement in his voice. It is just heavy with grief and an acceptance that is a little too late. “Rozy deserves to be sent off in peace, too.”

Shane closes his eyes and shudders in Ilya’s friend’s embrace.

When Svetlana arrives, she halts at the entrance, just as Marleau had done before her. Her eyes rove over the area, and over him, and the first thing she says is to tell him, in a curt voice, “There are an odd number of flowers here. That is wrong. It should be even.”

Shane blinks. He should have known that. He spent days on this, and yet could not even remember such a small detail. And he realises, though he has poured himself into his research… there is so much he does not know about Ilya’s culture. That he thought he would have so much time to learn about.

Before he can spiral, Rose steps out from behind him.

Without a word, she starts to delicately pull out one stalk from each bouquet around them. Svetlana watches her for a moment, before the hard lines in her face smooth out and her mouth trembles. Silently, she joins Rose.

There are only eight people in attendance – Shane, Yuna, David, Svetlana, Rose, Hayden, Jackie, and Marleau. Only eight people who had known the true person Ilya had been.

He tries to listen as his mother talks about Ilya, as Marleau does too. Mostly he hears a ringing in his ears, but some of their words stay with him.

“The kindest man in any room. Who cared even when people did not see it - especially then.”

“He was a rookie that had the confidence of a senior player - and it equally irritated and impressed the hell out of us on his first day.”

“In spaces where he could be free, Ilya loved loudly and joyously.”

“Someone who knew what you needed to hear, even if it was not what you wanted to.”

“He poured his heart into the Irina Foundation, and I know his mother is telling him how proud she is at this very moment.”

“A captain we would have followed to the ends of the Earth.”

They both look to him when they are done.

Shane looks away.

He follows Svetlana’s lead, and loops a belt around Ilya’s smiling face. In this photo, Ilya is beaming at the camera - one that Jackie had taken as he had laughed with the children. Shane remembered asking her to delete it. He is so profoundly grateful she had not listened to him, because…

Because Ilya is gone.

And what does he have of him, other than memories in his heart?

And who does he have to blame for that, other than himself?

After dinner, everyone scatters around. Shane hears snippets as everyone shares stories about Ilya to each other, and hears quiet crying and even some subdued laughter throughout.

Marleau walks up to him, then.

He stands quietly next to Shane for a moment, before he releases a breath and turns to face him.

“We want to retire his number.”

Shane blinks at that, mouth falling open slightly. But Marleau is not done.

“With us, with his Bears. In another life, maybe it would be with the Centaurs. Maybe we would still be angry with him. But… but he’s gone. And we loved him. No, we love him. Still. Always.” He says this in a rush, as though the words have been waiting to be released for a long time.

Shane does not know what to say. This barely scrapes the surface of what Ilya deserves; but it is still so good, so kind. “That’s amazing, Marleau. He would be… so happy.”

They sit in silence for a moment longer, before Marleau breaks it again.

“I hope he did not leave because he thought we wouldn’t be good with this; with you and him. Damn it…” Shane watches as Marleau’s head bows over slightly, fists pressed to his eyes. His voice breaks as he states, firmly, devastatingly, “We would have been good with it.”

“No… no he left because of me.” He wanted to be with me, be near me. And I couldn’t give him that. And Shane has to stop his train of thought, stop himself from thinking of the what ifs, because what if…

What if…

What if he had never walked up to him on that first day?

What if he had stayed away when he walked away that one dreadful afternoon?

What if they had never confessed their love for each other?

What if Ilya had never left Boston for him?

He would have never been in the Centaurs. He would never have been on that damn plane.

He would still be here, by Shane’s side, where he belongs.

Distantly, he feels a throbbing pain burst at his knees, and hears a man’s panicked voice.

But all he can hear clearly now is a ringing in his ears, and all he can see is Ilya’s beaming face on the table, surrounded by flowers. He stares at it, and everything else falls away.

Seconds may have passed, or maybe even a century, until he finally hears something else.

It is Rose’s voice that breaks through to him, when Shane realises he is on his knees. Her gentle hands cradle him as he finally breaks, crying all his hurt and regret out into her shoulder. But it is wrong wrong wrong… her hands are too soft, her murmurs are too sweet.

It should be Ilya’s rough, hockey-worn hands cradling him. It should be Ilya’s deep, calming voice comforting him.

It should be Ilya.

It should be Ilya.

It should be Ilya. It should be Ilya. It should be Ilya. It should be Ilya. ItshouldbeIlya. ItshouldbeIlya. ItshouldbeIlya.

ItshouldbeIlyaitshouldbeIlyaitshouldbeIlya.

IlyaIlyaIlyaIlyaIlyaIlyaIlya.

Ilya.

Shane crumbles, even as his parents and Hayden and Jackie pile into the hug, desperate to hold him together. He sobs and screams in the middle of them all. He pulls on his hair, he rocks back and forth, knocking into those around him who try to soothe.

He has cracked wide open, and he has no idea if he can ever put himself back together into the person he had been with Ilya.

He does not know how he will ever stop crying.

Because Ilya is dead.

And he is too.

--------------------------------------------

There is no fire burning, and it is so cold. The lake is calm, and the full moon is reflected in it. Shane shivers in the cold, feeling goosebumps on his skin. He looks out into this quiet part of the world that he had shared with Ilya. He thinks that even the night is heavy with grief; the trees bending slightly even with no wind pushing at them, the stars a little less bright than usual, the water calm and almost too still. The loons are silent for the moment, almost as if they know there is no one here to tease anymore.

He sits in the silence and mourns with them, these natural beings that were one of the only few living things in the world that had the honour to witness Ilya in his most carefree and loving state. He wonders if the waters will miss Ilya swimming in it, if the shore will miss Ilya’s racing steps on it, if the clouds will miss Ilya’s increasingly absurd interpretations of their forms. He likes to think that they will.

Shane sits and breathes through his first few hours of understanding and accepting that Ilya no longer exists in this beautiful world.

It is indescribable. To know that Ilya’s heart no longer beats here, that neither the Sun nor the Moon will catch him with their light. To know that in these hundreds of thousands of miles of land and sea and sky, Ilya no longer takes up space in any of them.

It is unimaginable.

Tears are steadily streaking across his cheeks again when Svetlana finds him. The Moon has reached its highest peak, lighting up her path to him, and the house is quiet and dark behind them.

She brings a blanket with her, and places it next to him before she sits down too.

They both sit in silence for a long while.

Then a loon lets out a piercing call, Svetlana jumps, and Shane, to his own surprise, laughs.

They both blink at each other, before Shane tells her, “Ilya jumped worse the first time he heard a loon.”

Svetlana looks at him, and when she speaks, she says, “I wanted to hate you.”

Shane says nothing. Svetlana takes a deep breath, the first of her tears falling ever since she arrived, “It would be so much easier if I could hate you. But I know Ilyusha would not have wanted that. He would want us to love each other. But… But I am so angry at you. And I am angry at him. And… and I am angry at myself. I am so angry, Shane Hollander.”

She does not sound angry. She sounds exhausted. She sounds sad.

“You can, if you want to. Hate me.”

“No.” She shakes her head, dislodging more tears. “I can’t.”

“Svetlana.”

“No, Shane, please.”

Shane turns towards her, and there is a desperate edge in his voice, “If you cannot hate me, then be angry with me. Be angry, I deserve it. Please, be angry.”

“No,” and she is still shaking her head, refusing to look at him, “Ilyusha would not want this.”

“Ilya is gone!” He gasps out, heart rocketing as he shouts the words for the first time. They echo across the lake and its surrounding forest, letting each drop of water and blade of grass know this truth.

She moves towards him then, and he flinches, squeezing his eyes as he braces for long-awaited harshness.

Instead, he feels her strong arms wrap around him and her tears dampen his shoulder.

“I cannot be angry with you, I do not want to be.” She sobs, gripping the back of his shirt, every drop of the composure she had clung onto so desperately throughout the evening lost. “Only you can understand me. Only you can understand what we have lost. Ilyusha.”

Her voice breaks on Ilya’s name, and Shane feels as she lets him carry her weight as she cries in earnest. Shane joins her, wrapping his own trembling arms tight around her, his tears mixing with hers.

They sit like that under the Moon’s gaze for hours, sharing the heavy load of a grief that can only ever come from the purest, truest love.

--------------------------------------------

When the season resumes three days later, Shane attends Montreal’s first practice. Hayden hugs him tightly as he enters, but other than that, nothing has changed. He feels wrung-out, and every waking moment he spends reliving the funeral in his mind.

But none of his team, bar Hayden, knows that Shane is living without his heart. They clap him on the shoulder as they greet him, and while the atmosphere is still more solemn than usual, there are some lighthearted chirps being thrown around.

Shane breathes around it, trying to centre himself. He tells himself to take comfort in the familiarity. He laces up his skates, places his paddings where they should go.

He glides onto the ice.

And he thinks of how Ilya will never do the same again.

Ilya will never speak to his team as their captain again, never get to use his words to encourage and motivate them again. Ilya will never get to wink at the camera when he completes a beautiful shot again. Ilya will never chirp at other players again, never laugh as he skates circles around them again, never tease his beloved fans again.

Ilya will never look at him from across the ice again, gaze full of love. Ilya will never send him a small smile again, during a face-off.

Shane will never get to see it again.

Shane barely makes it back into the stands before he vomits his breakfast out.

He barely registers his team surrounding him, asking him if he is alright. He wipes his mouth, pulls his skates off roughly, and steps unsteadily away from the rink.

In his mind, he hears Ilya calling out for him, telling him to come back. With every step he takes, the voice gets louder and louder, increasingly desperate. He shuts his mind down. He shuts Ilya out.

He does not attend anymore practices.

He does not play anymore games.

The world watches the first season of the NHL without Ilya Rozanov… and without Shane Hollander.

--------------------------------------------

Shane knows he survives only with the endless patience and kindness of those around him.

Without being asked, Hayden and Marly take over the roles of main coaches for the Irina Foundation’s hockey camps. Scott Hunter and Ryan Price volunteer more of their time, each citing their own personal need to do so, because somehow, Ilya had touched both their lives too. With their hard work, with his mother spearheading the operations, the foundation continues running, growing bigger and expanding its reach with each passing month. Shane reads all the reports, smiles at the photographs of the children and coaches at the camps, and feels like the biggest failure.

Shane lives in his cottage now, away from Montreal and away from society. He goes to the gym everyday, eats healthier than he ever has before - when he remembers that he has to eat. He watches new TV programs. Sometimes they make him laugh, and when that happens he immediately switches the channel. He hosts his parents, Hayden’s family, and Rose over for dinner once every few weeks. It is at their insistence. Wellness checks he has heard Hayden whisper to JJ over the phone.

Shane lets them. He is too tired to argue.

And it does help - he feels lighter after each session, a smile easier to come to his face. It all comes to a head, though, during a dinner six months after the funeral.

Ruby is barely eating, playing around with her food, pushing it from side to side with her fork. Then, she looks Shane straight in the eyes and admits, voice trembling, “Uncle Shane, I miss Uncle Ilya”. Both Hayden and Jackie’s heads shoot up immediately, and they look at him with horror badly disguised on their faces.

It pauses Shane in his tracks - why should Ilya’s memory, why should Ilya, be something they are scared of?

He does not want that.

So Shane turns to Ruby, who he realises with a sinking heart, has tears in her eyes. In a quiet voice, he confesses right back to her, “I miss Uncle Ilya, too.” When she sniffles, he pushes himself out of his chair and walks over to her. She meets him halfway, and he lifts her up, holding her close as she cries in earnest on his shoulder.

When he looks back at the others, he sees that Jade is in Jackie’s arms now, both of them quietly crying. Hayden has a hand on Arthur and Amber, and his eyes are wet as he looks back at Shane too.

Then Arthur’s small voice breaks the silence. “Can I draw something for Uncle Ilya? I know he is far away in the sky now, but we can use a rocket ship and send it?”

Shane has to take a steady breath before he can answer, Arthur’s childhood innocence shining through and piercing his heart. After a moment, Shane dredges up a smile for the little boy - the one that Ilya had always said reminded him of Shane the most - and he nods.

They all lay on the floor after dinner, the children drawing for Ilya, while Shane, Jackie, and even Hayden write letters to him. After, Shane collected the letters from them and placed them carefully into a little box he had.

When they left that night, Shane cried himself to sleep, clutching Ilya’s shirt in his hands.

When he woke up the next morning, it was easier to breathe.

Life goes on, in a manner of speaking.

--------------------------------------------

Ilya visits him, sometimes, in his dreams.

It is not always the same - sometimes they are on the rink, playing against each other; sometimes he walks up to him again smoking right next to a no-smoking sign in Saskatchewan; sometimes they are in bed in the cover of the night, every part of their bodies melded together; sometimes they are having a quiet dinner with his parents, Ilya and his dad working together to complete a puzzle; sometimes they are at Bood’s barbeque, laughing with the rest of the Centaurs.

Though by far the most, Ilya visits him at their cottage.

They spend beautiful hours there together - laughing and cuddling and kissing.

Shane is not sure which dreams are more merciful - the ones in which he has accepted that Ilya has gone, or the ones where he does not know that that ever happens. Though in ones where he knows the gift he has been given - this precious gift of getting to spend time with his Ilya again - he cherishes the moments even more. He cups Ilya’s face gently, and presses soft kisses to every inch he can reach. He twists the blonde curls around his fingers. He charts constellations across the moles on his back.

Most of all, he loves him and loves him and loves him.

Then he wakes up, and his world stops spinning again.

--------------------------------------------

It is Svetlana, in the end, that saves him from himself.

On the first anniversary of the plane’s disappearance, Shane does not intend to attend the ceremony.

He receives many texts from others, wondering where he is, expecting him to be at the cottage and worrying when they do not find him there. Shane replies to them, then leaves his phone turned over. He looks around Ilya’s house, where he is seated on the couch. Unmoving. Unblinking.

He does not register the light jingle of keys and the door turning open. It is only when Svetlana speaks that he realises she still has still kept her own spare set.

“Everyone thinks you are at the cottage.”

“You didn’t?”

“No.” Her voice is soft, and she looks at him carefully. After a moment of thought, she sits next to him, and says, “That was Ilyusha’s favourite place. This is yours.”

“It is. How did you know?”

Svetlana’s smile is trembling as she says, “Because it still smells like him.”

Shane does not realise he is crying until she gathers him into her arms, and hugs him close. She lets him cry, and then asks, voice still soft, “Will you be going to the ceremony tonight?”

He stays silent at that - because he himself is still not sure of the answer. After a moment, he tells her, “They wanted me to say something, because of the rivalry. I don’t know… I don’t know if I can.”

“And you don’t have to,” she tells him simply, “if you feel like you cannot.”

But Shane has grown closer to her over these past few months, and he can feel it in her stiff posture that she has more to say. Sitting up, he looks at her.

“Sveta.”

She looks away from his gaze, and he frowns.

“Sveta.”

She sighs, and her voice is heavy when she tells him, “What I want to say… is very selfish.”

“Tell me anyway.”

She looks at him for a moment, dark brown eyes boring into his. Then, she seems to steel herself, before she tells him, “I want his legacy remembered. I know, off the ice, the relationship that the world knows between you two is wrong.”

A bit of an understatement, Shane thinks, almost hysterically.

“But on the ice, people know. The greatest players, ” her voice deepens as she speaks more passionately, “the greatest rivals. The both of you were in a league of your own. It was always Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov. You started together and,” her voice hitches, and she blinks back the wetness in her eyes, “... and I think you should end it together too. End it for Ilya; give him closure on the ice, just as you have done off it.”

As her words taper off, his eyes drift over to the picture hanging on the wall across from him. Ilya and his laughing faces from their CCM shoot together stare back at him.

He swallows against a lump in his throat.

Svetlana is right, because of course she is.

Hockey had helped him say hello to Ilya. He should help hockey say goodbye.

Finally, he nods. Shane holds her back just as tightly when she throws her arms around him, and does not mention the tears that fall from her eyes to his shoulders.

So that is how Shane finds himself back in the Centaurs’ home rink again. He tries to ignore the many cameras pointed in his direction, and tries - but fails - to ignore the murmurs of people who are excitedly saying that “the legendary recluse is back”.

Shane presses himself a little more firmly against Marly, who sits beside him. As though he understands, Marly presses a bit of weight back into him, grounding Shane back into the present moment.

His eyes scan the crowd.

Shane had come with Svetlana, but he does not sit with her. He cannot, because their seats are not placed together - him; with the rest of the hockey players, her; with the grieving families. No one knows how their love for Ilya ties them together now.

He sees her, sitting alone in the seats meant for Ilya’s family.

Just one person - everyone watching right now will think that Ilya has only ever been loved by one person.

He dimly hears his name being called, and it is only Marly’s gentle squeeze to his shoulder that reminds him of why he is here. On shaking legs, Shane stands, skating to the center of the rink, where they had placed a pedestal.

He stands there, looking out into the crowd. He sees Hayden and his family in the section for players, he sees his parents in their reserved seats, he sees Marly back in the seats he just left, he sees Rose scattered even further away from them in a section meant for fans.

His eyes hone on to Svetlana again, sitting up with pride in Ilya’s section. Crying alone and silently.

This is all wrong.

His skin tingles, an almost overpowering calm taking over. Ilya Rozanov is loved. He is adored and revered and remembered and loved.

Most of all by Shane Hollander.

And the world should know that.

He takes a deep breath… and finally speaks his truth to the world.

It is exhilarating and terrifying, and Shane is sure that his heart is going to beat right out of his chest. He talks and talks, and it feels like his soul has lifted from his body. He feels like he is watching himself - how his eyes blink rapidly as he struggles to keep his composure. He hears his voice crack over Ilya’s name, and hears, even under his trembling breath, the love he has for him.

When it is done, only the sound of his deep breathing can be heard, echoing across the rink.

There is a beat of complete silence. Right as Shane begins to pray for the ground to swallow him whole, there is a hesitant clap. Not from Svetlana, or Rose, or any of his loved ones in the crowd.

No, it is a stranger.

No, not a stranger. A fan.

A fan who stands and applauds in his #81 Rozanov jersey.

Then, another.

And then, another.

Soon, the whole rink is on its feet. For him and Ilya. Not for their rivalry, but for their love.

After, when he skates over to where Svetlana is, Shane cannot help but look around the rink again. He sees his and Ilya’s loved ones rushing over to them, sees Scott Hunter’s approving smile, sees how the crowd around him cries and cheers in equal measure.

He hears the echoes of Ilya and of the Centaurs in the chaos of the love being loudly celebrated. He looks down at his skates, at the lines he makes across the ice, and finally feels at home again.

When he looks back up and takes in the atmosphere around him, a seed of an idea plants itself right into his brain… and more importantly, into his heart.

-----------------------------------------

It is a long and arduous journey to bring to life the goal he had made in that moment. With two forces of nature - his mother and Svetlana - by his side, however, they pull it off.

Shane makes the announcement a few days before the new season begins. On his Instagram, he writes - Press conference at noon; Ottawa rink.

No other details.

At precisely twelve p.m. sharp, he breathes in deeply in the wings of the stage, before he walks over slowly to sit next to his new coach in front of the press. The chatter dies down, as everyone waits with baited breath.

“My name is Shane Hollander,” he starts, his voice - clear and strong - echoing around the room, and he smiles at the crowd, “and it is my pleasure to be captain of the Ottawa Phoenixes.”

The next few days are full of interviews, where Shane reiterates over and over again that this team is set to honour those that they lost. As his team is slowly introduced to the public, as they start to get acquainted with each other’s playing styles, it is clear there is something special growing.

When Hayden Pike and Cliff Marleau are introduced as the last members of the team, Shane feels his heart finally settle.

Here they were.

The Phoenixes; meant to rise from the ashes of the Centaurs.

-----------------------------------------

Time passes, as time does.

It is nearly five years to the day he lost Ilya.

But Shane is not crying right now. He is sad, he will always be sad.

But he has learnt he can be happy again too.

Like right in this moment, as Ilyana - Svetlana and Cliff’s daughter - runs up to him for a hug as his parents and him arrive for her third birthday party. She screams “Dyadya Shay!” and he holds his arms out to catch his goddaughter. He lifts her up, presses a kiss to her curls, and smiles as Svetlana complains about having to go to the bathroom again as their son presses down on her bladder. He watches Cliff press a kiss to the side of her head.

From across the yard, the Pike children wave at him from the bouncy castle as he walks to their parents.

“Ruby and Jade had to write about their hero in school,” Hayden greets him with, Jackie already chuckling beside him, and Shane looks at him as he smiles, “They both wrote about Ilya. He can still annoy me somehow, can’t he?”

Shane laughs, and says, “You know him. Nothing can keep Ilya from doing what he loves.”

As they both chuckle, in his arms, Ilyana perks up at Ilya’s name as she always does. She looks at him, a mirror image of her mother, and asks him in her sweet voice, “Dyadya Iya story?”

She has yet to say his - and thus, nor her own - name right, but she gets closer everyday, much to Shane’s anticipation.

He laughs and asks, always ready to indulge her, “Which one?”

“Wolf bird!”

“You like that one, don’t you?”

She nods her head, patting her chest proudly, “Dyadya Iya same like Iyana. Wolf bird scary, grrr.”

If anyone notices how Shane laughs and then hides his face in her hair to cover his tears, no one says anything.

Instead, as he walks over to them towards the cake with three little candles lit on it, with Ilyana in his arms, they all smile. Shane smiles right back.

-----------------------------------------

On the fifth anniversary of the plane’s disappearance, Shane warms up with the Ottawa Phoenixes in the rink they shared. Hayden taps his helmet against his, and Cliff slaps his back.

He looks around at this group of talented, kind men. Some of them knew the Centaurs’ personally, others knew them only through the shared grief of the hockey world.

All of them wanted to make their predecessors proud.

And they would, he would make sure of it.

He grins, and chases the puck down the ice.